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Divorce Rates by Profession

Surprisingly, not much good data is available connecting divorce rates and occupation. A 2010 study is the only one I found that does a relatively thorough job of it. The huge table below (listing divorce rates by profession) is the data provided by that study.

The reason I became curious about this is that I read in American Sniper that Navy SEAL’s divorce rate is 90-95%. Whether that’s true or not, it made me wonder what the rate is for other occupations. It seems intuitive to me that a person’s job may be one of the best predictors of a marriage’s success or failure. The balance between work and family seems to be a common day-to-day struggle of the middle class average Joe.

There are a lot of factors wrapped up in what occupation a person has. The job defines the amount of hours you work, the mental toll it takes, and also the personality you develop from succeeding or failing at that job. And conversely, the job you choose is certainly a reflection of your personality.

The table below identifies that the highest divorce rates are for dancers, bartenders, and massage therapists, all around 40%. Perhaps the extroverted nature of these job reflects a personality that is unwilling to commit or quickly gets tired of the same old thing. The occupations with the lowest divorce rates (of less than 10%) mostly seem to be engineers. I was very surprised to read this, because of the intellectual and mental toll that a lot of these jobs take. The engineers I know become extremely passionate about their work, which I assumed can take away from the marriage. But perhaps it doesn’t. There’s hope for us nerds after all.

35 thoughts on “Divorce Rates by Profession”

No, it’s the divorce rate as determining by the Census which is the ratio divorces to marriages in a given year (or longer time period). So they take the number of divorces in a say year 2000 and divide it by the number of marriages in the year 2000. It’s just an estimate, but turns out to be a good one.

Eh, if that’s the methodology then this is kind of a questionable set of data. Reminds me of the bogus statistic that always gets thrown around claiming 50% of married people divorce because there are half as many divorces each year as there are new marriages. That’d be like saying since the the death rate is lower than the birth rate, only 2/3rds of people will one day die.

Also note that the the professions with the highest divorce rates are predominantly youth-dominated professions, since young people as a whole are much more likely to divorce at any given time. States with young median ages also tend to have a higher number of annual divorces than states with older populations.

Overall, it’s interesting but you have to take this stuff with a grain of salt.

Well put, there a lot of false interpretations to such broad statistical generalization, but in a way the purpose of this data is to start a conversation not to end one with a definitive conclusion. Thanks for the insightful comment Trevor.

I think it becomes worse if those at the top intermarry. For example a bartender marrying a dancer. So as an engineer, i should marry a bartender or dancer so that the blend becomes ‘moderate’ and ‘manageable’. I now understand why marriage of the so the so-called celebrities never last.

Good point on the celebrities. I wonder if the kind of “cross-breeding” you suggest works to reduce the probability of divorce. It could be a chicken/egg problem where people that are not ready for commitment seek out a particular job in which case it might not matter who they marry.

Bartenders have much more opportunity to meet lonely people of the opposite sex. Many male engineers are nerdy and non-womanizers who work with other male engineers. Exposure to the opposite sex makes a big difference.

Are these statistics normalized? Because air traffic controllers have incredibly high divorce rates, but there are only about 26,200 controllers in the entire nation. So I’m a little skeptical about the results.

What do you mean by normalized? The number of people in a given profession does not effect the average rates except in the fact that the margin of error is higher for the rarer profession. But you’re right there are a lot of potential flaws with this data. Still, it’s a good starting point.

I think the disparity has more to do with the person’s ability, or perceived ability, to find a replacement mate. If you know the hunk/babe you see at work every day would take you in a heart beat, it’s harder to put up with your spouse’s flaws. On the flip side, if you never had success getting a date, and you’re pretty sure this is the only chance you have, you will probably put up with more. Just like it’s a lot easier to get sick of a job’s BS and quit if have another one lined up across the street.

Dancers, bartenders, and massage therapists are usually healthy, sociable, good looking people… who work with other sociable, good looking people. Engineers… not so much.

Another interesting thought: I bet the majority of dancers, bartenders, and massage therapists are women. And most engineers are definitely men.

That’s very interesting. I wonder if it has to do with how much socializing you do due to your profession and your personality. More social contact means less time for dark introspective suicidal thoughts.

So I graduated college with a civil engineering degree and upon graduation, I enlisted and went through BUD/S and graduated about a year ago. Anyone want to take a stab at my chances of getting married and making it last?

I’m surprised to read about the low divorce rate of engineers. My dad is an engineer who has been divorced twice. He doesn’t seem to have been able to cope very well with his relationships with his children either. I have several close friends who are also “children of engineers”, who describe their fathers as difficult to relate to and not very good as fathers, in the emotional caring sense.

It’s sad to think that these people who are brilliant at engineering have such trouble in their personal relationships, and apparently have a higher suicide rate. I wonder what can be done to support them.

I’m currently seeking more research material in this area, so keen to hear where the suicide rate info came from.

As a son of an engineer, I share your surprise at these statistics. Engineers are often workaholics, but perhaps they also love their job, and are thus happier. I think a happier person is more likely to maintain a happy marriage.

Physicians, surgeons and lawyers also have jobs take their mental toll and many of them are very passionate about their work, but they also have pretty low divorce rates. In my opinion, there seems to be somewhat emotional vs rational pattern in those statistics.

Infatuation
Amphetamine-based chemistry (PEA), which lasts only 8 months to 4 years.
Brain state related to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
Unable to see partner clearly and objectively in this state

Deeper bonding
As the infatuation phase fades, the relationship may move to an opiate-based chemistry, which is calmer but more additive. Some may be incapable of moving to second phase and become â€œlove junkiesâ€

It is possible to love, feel bond and affection for a single person through the rest of your life, but it is biochemically impossible to be constantly madly infatuated with one person through the rest of your life. The more rational people are less likely to become infatuation windbags, love junkies etc, less likely to enter this vicious cycle of “Boohoo, I’m not “in love” (actually infatuated) with him/her anymore, I’m in love (infatuated) with someone else, this means that my spouse is not “the one”, must get divorce.”

THE MORE ADVANCED A SOCIETY, THE HIGHER THE DIVORCE RATE. THE MORE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE THINK THEY ARE, THE HIGHER THE DIVORCE RATE. THE MORE POWERFUL PEOPLE ARE, THE HIGHER THE DIVORCE RATE. THE MORE FAMOUS PEOPLE BECOME, THE HIGHER THE DIVORCE RATE. THE MORE PEOPLE GET DIVORCED, THE HIGHER THE DIVORCE RATE CLIMBS. THE BOTTOM LINE IS, THAT ALL TYPES OF SOCIETY AND CIVILIZATIONS BECOME OBSOLETE AND SELF DESTRUCT. MARRIAGE AS WE KNOW IT WILL BECOME OBSOLETE AND ANOTHER FORM OF LIVING TOGETHER WILL EVENTUALLY BECOME THE NORM.